Code of Silence
by KuryakinGirl
Summary: Isn’t it a kind of madness/to be living by a code of silence/when you’ve really got a lot to say. Sequel to To the Victor Goes the Spoils (Story ID: 1275739). WW/Alias XO. Complete.
1. Chapter 1 of 5

Disclaimer-Characters belong to either Aaron Sorkin or J.J. Abrams. Title and lyrics come from a Billy Joel song. No copyright infringement intended. Any similarity to events or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.  
  
Author's Notes-To the 'Sirens, with love. Especially Double-oh-Agent Dis, my grammar hero and the one who puts up with my idiotic questions. To my computer guru, my big brother (who rocks), thank you for telling a computer illiterate person about the history of the Internet one Wednesday afternoon. To the 'Crew, also with love. I didn't think it could be done the first time; I certainly wasn't prepared for a sequel to form in my brain. And yet here it is. The organized world of J.J. and the chaotic world of Aaron. I hope this works again.  
  
Feedback-Always greatly appreciated.  
  
Spoilers-This takes place in the off-season for both shows. 'Course, before those last, oh, two minutes of the season finale of Alias, of course. I figure I have two years to play with before September. Ish. When do they start back?  
  
Archive-Let me know, thanks.  
  
Code of Silence-Isn't it a kind of madness/to be living by a code of silence/when you've really got a lot to say. Sequel to To the Victor Goes the Spoils (Story ID: 1275739).  
  
And it's hard to believe after all these years That it still gives you pain and it still brings tears And you feel like a fool Because in spite of your rules You've got a memory  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Today  
  
Now  
  
She leaned against his doorjamb, waiting for him to get off the phone. She was tired, having gotten off a plane only two hours before. She'd gone through a fast de-briefing with her boss and had changed into a pair of jeans and a tee shirt, a Princeton zippered, hooded sweatshirt zipped halfway up, the sleeves pushed back slightly. Her dark hair was back in a ponytail, and her glasses were hanging from the collar of her shirt. Her green eyes were closed. She was a study in exhaustion.  
  
He was rubbing his forehead, listening to the voice on the other end. "I said forget about it, Amy. We're not killing it. Tell the First Lady it's a matter of national security... Because it is... I can't tell you what, exactly, it's going towards because, y'know what? It's national security and you don't have the clearance for that kind of thing. The First Lady isn't usually, y'know, privy to that kind of information and she's certainly not a decision maker with regards to stuff like this." Josh Lyman sighed and glanced at his watch. "I gotta go, Amy. This matter's finished. It's going to pass. The President's going to sign it. Let this one slide." He sighed. "Fine," he said, hanging up and standing up.  
  
His dress shirt was slightly wrinkled. The tie he wore had been loosened somewhere along the course of the day, and the top button had been unbuttoned. He pulled on his suit coat and killed his desk lamp before moving around to the doorjamb, where she stood. "Crys..."  
  
She slowly opened her eyes, looking into his warm dark eyes. "Hm?"  
  
"You sure you want to go to this thing tonight?"  
  
"I'm positive."  
  
"'Cause you look really tired."  
  
She smiled gently. "I'm fine."  
  
"All right," he said, kissing her cheek quickly and easing an arm around her waist. The two slipped out of his office and started through the bullpen. "Donna, we're gone. See you tomorrow."  
  
"Going? But it's only seven..."  
  
"I've got a thing I have to go to, then I've got a whole stack of briefing books in my car with my name on them to sift through tonight, so... Yeah, I'm getting out of here and I'll see you tomorrow."  
  
His blonde assistant looked puzzled. "There's no thing on your schedule..."  
  
"It's a personal thing."  
  
She glanced at Crystal Seaborn, the woman on his arm. "Ah..."  
  
"See you tomorrow."  
  
She nodded, looking back at her boss. "All right."  
  
"G'night, Donna," Josh said, leading Crystal out of the White House. They signed out then looked out the window at the pouring rain. "Y'know, I'm not even sure I want to go."  
  
"Yeah, you are," she said with a nod.  
  
"Yeah..."  
  
"Looks like we'll have to make a run for it."  
  
"Damn, my umbrella's in my car..." He removed his coat covering his head with it as Crystal covered her head with her hood, pulling her sleeves back down to her wrists.  
  
"Race ya?" she asked, a soft Southern drawl surfacing and a slight smirk appearing on her face.  
  
He pulled the keys out of his pocket and handed them to her. "I'm going to lose."  
  
"Wimp."  
  
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. After you."  
  
A security guard opened the door, and the two were soon running out of the building through the torrential rain towards the gate. Crystal, as Josh had predicted, was ahead of him. He attributed the fact, in his head and only temporarily, that she was ahead to her sneakers and his loafers. He knew quite well she used to run cross-country in high school and that she was in far better shape than she was. Of course, there was also the fact that she was a highly trained field agent with the CIA. And the fact that he didn't necessarily mind watching her run.  
  
She had his doors unlocked and was sitting in the passenger seat by the time he reached the car, sliding behind the wheel and tossing his coat in the back seat. Starting the car, he pulled out of his parking space. "How can you have a candle-light vigil in a rainstorm?" he asked as they entered traffic.  
  
"A conundrum, isn't it?" she asked, drying her glasses on her sweatshirt.  
  
"Seriously. There wasn't an alternate location or a rain date."  
  
"They'll either construct a shelter or we'll be huddled under umbrellas, I'm sure."  
  
"Probably umbrellas. I don't think they can construct a shelter on the grass there... and this rainstorm blew up out of nowhere."  
  
"And, who'd want to stand under a shelter on the grass, 'cause the ground'll still be muddy."  
  
"Fair point," Josh acknowledged.  
  
"How big is your umbrella...?"  
  
"Big enough for two," he said with a smile, glancing at her.  
  
She nodded, slipping her glasses on and silently watching out the front windshield as he maneuvered them through the city towards the Vietnam Memorial. The familiar buildings and landmarks rolled by as he drove and she thought about how much had changed in her life, and how much things had stayed the same.  
  
And she thought about her reaction when he'd talked to her a little earlier, telling her about his plans for the evening and if she wanted to come along.  
  
He soon brought her out of her reverie as he parked the car as close to the monuments as he could get. She waited on him to get out of the car first with the umbrella, and like the gentleman he could sometimes be, he came around to her side, welcoming her under his golf umbrella. The two walked together towards the crowd in silence.  
  
As Crystal had predicted, the sidewalk in front of the Vietnam Wall was packed with people under umbrellas, holding long white taper candles. As they approached, a veteran in his uniform handed the pair a candle each. As they neared the group, they spotted a familiar face, the face Josh had come to honor.  
  
"Leo," he said softly.  
  
The White House Chief of Staff turned back and nodded. He was obviously holding back emotions that were threatening to break through. "Thanks," he managed.  
  
Crystal eased out from under Josh's umbrella, joining the crowded umbrella with Leo McGarry and his daughter, Mallory O'Brien. "Didn't know you were coming, too," Mallory said quietly as Crystal gently peeled the wick of her candle from the top of the taper, making it stand.  
  
"Just got in from the coast," she said, lighting her candle off Leo's.  
  
"How's Sam?" Mallory asked.  
  
She shrugged slightly. "He's okay. He's getting reacquainted with everything. He wanted me to tell you if I saw you that you should, y'know, take a vacation when school's out." She looked up at her with a knowing look, then slipped back under Josh's umbrella, lighting his candle with her flame.  
  
He had to hold onto the umbrella and his candle, but Crystal had a free arm to loop around his waist as the memorial service began.  
  
Listening to the proceedings, honoring the Vietnam veterans and the dead, Crystal thought about the past twenty-four hours. And the past twenty years of her life. When the veteran talked about the horrors of what had gone on, she tightened her grip on his waist, resting her head on his shoulder.  
  
Why?  
  
It was the only question that came to her mind over and over again.  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Seventeen years ago  
  
Evening  
  
She pulled her dark hair back, watching her reflection in the mirror. Leaning forward, she carefully removed the contacts from her green eyes and placed them in their respective holders before slipping her glasses on. She walked in her shorts and tee shirt to the chair by the bed, picking up the zippered sweatshirt she'd tossed over the arm earlier and slipped it on, zipping it up, both sides forming a word across the front: Princeton.  
  
"I'm thinking chicken for dinner," she said as she emerged from the bedroom, heading through the living room of the small apartment. When there was no response, she glanced over, noticing that her boyfriend was engrossed in something, sitting on the couch, a determined look in his eye and headphones on his ears. Shaking her head, she entered the kitchen and started pulling things out of the cabinets and refrigerator to cook. Ian Guthrie was the consummate professional, always working.  
  
At least, that's what Crystal Seaborn believed.  
  
She was only twenty-one and had been working with Ian for three years. She'd been recruited early, to say the least, and the CIA paid for her college education. She had one more semester before gaining her degree in psychology from George Washington University in D.C. She'd opted for her summer off; she'd pushed herself entirely too hard in the spring semester, in and out of the country and trying to study while overseas was rough.  
  
She smiled when a pair of arms circled her waist from behind and a chin rested on her shoulder. "Hey," she murmured.  
  
"Chicken, huh?" he asked.  
  
She nodded. "Sound okay?"  
  
"Sounds great. How are you, by the way? You looked really tired when you came in from class."  
  
She hadn't thought he'd noticed. "Eh. I am tired, but I'm okay."  
  
"I'm worried about you, y'know."  
  
"No worries."  
  
"No, seriously, Crys. I think you're pushing yourself too hard. I think you should take a breather, take a break."  
  
"Please. I'm fine. I'm taking this semester off. I'll graduate in December. Everything'll be great."  
  
"It would kill you to take two weeks off?" he asked, kissing her neck.  
  
"I'm fine," she said, smiling softly.  
  
"C'mon. You could take a vacation. You haven't had one since you started training."  
  
"Don't need one."  
  
"You don't have to be Wonder Woman, y'know. You can take a break. You keep saying you want to go to Italy..."  
  
"Yeah... But I figure if I hang out in this job long enough, I'll get there."  
  
"Yeah, but you'll be *working*. C'mon, Crys. Take a break."  
  
"You tryin' to get rid of me, Ian?"  
  
"Of course not."  
  
"'Cause it sounds it."  
  
"I just think you should take some time off, have some fun. You're twenty-one. You have your whole life to work."  
  
"Well... Yeah," she said, stirring the vegetables on the stove.  
  
"You should apply for the time off, for the travel approval."  
  
"Y'know... I guess a week really wouldn't kill me or anybody else."  
  
"Atta girl."  
  
"You better see if you can come, too." She set the spoon on the rest on the stove, turning in his arms to put her arms around his neck.  
  
"You know it." He leaned down, brushing his lips across hers.  
  
She smiled. "What were you working on in there? You were, like, totally spaced out, man."  
  
"We're not talking about work."  
  
"You were working? On what?"  
  
"On something that doesn't matter because you're going to secure a form tomorrow and request for the travel and time off while I work on whatever I'm working on."  
  
"Y'know, I'm not the only one who works all the time."  
  
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Aren't you supposed to be cooking?"  
  
She rolled her eyes.  
  
"It better not burn like last time."  
  
"That was not my fault."  
  
"Were you cooking?"  
  
"Get out," she laughed, pushing him away.  
  
He left, heading into the living room. He removed the tape from the player. It was plain black, the label marked only with three characters: "SD-6." He picked up a handheld device and held the tape on the bottom, pressing the on button and magnetically erasing the tape. Ian dropped the tape into a used mailing envelope, with only his name and home address on the cover. Returning to the kitchen, he tossed it in the near-full garbage bag. "Want me to take out the trash?" he asked.  
  
She glanced over at his lanky frame, drawn to his piercing hazel eyes, and smiled. "Sure."  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Yesterday  
  
Morning  
  
She lightly drummed her fingers on the desktop in front of her, watching as Agent Kendall gave his presentation on their latest assignment.  
  
They'd hit a dead-end with the Sloane investigation.  
  
She lost one best friend, almost lost another.  
  
It had been a bizarre encounter.  
  
But now, it seemed as though they were back to square one in regard to where Sloane was, and even Irina Derevko. Kendall agreed. "It's true. We can't predict the future, not with cloudy crystal balls. Each of you has a file in front of you with your assignment. To learn about the future, we're going to assess the past. The files in front of you have information about Sloane during his last few years at CIA as well as his tenure leading SD-6. Some of these will be dead ends. Some of these may seem trivial. The key, however, is in these files somewhere. Somewhere, in this, we'll find a connection to where Sloane is now. Maybe there's a contact believed dead that one of you finds. Maybe there's a hidden money trail to a house, an investment. Agent Jack Bristow is going to take point on this," Kendall said. "He worked for SD-6 the longest, had the longest association with Arvin Sloane. He should be able to help you sift through the unnecessary information, and... there is quite a bit of information to work through. The files in front of you just have the overview of the information you're about to be bombarded with." He surveyed the assembled agents then nodded. "Get to work."  
  
The assembled agents started to pick up their assignments and leave. Sydney was slow to stand up, opening her folder and heading for the door.  
  
Michael Vaughn fell in step with her. "What'd you get?"  
  
"Correspondence, 1980-1989," she said, glancing up at him. "You?"  
  
"Timelines, CIA operations and SD-6 operations to see, if any, overlaps." He glanced at her. "Wanna trade?"  
  
She looked at him with a slight smile. "Pass."  
  
"You sure?" he asked, returning the smile.  
  
"Pretty sure, yeah."  
  
"Either way, it's torture," he said, shaking his head and holding his file under his arm.  
  
"No kidding. I get that you have to learn about the present from the past, but... We're looking for a needle in a haystack."  
  
Vaughn nodded. "Torture."  
  
She looked back over the top sheet in her file folder. "And this worries me," she said, pointing at the page. "It says there are several boxes of information. It doesn't say how many boxes..."  
  
"Not on the next page?" he asked, looking over her shoulder.  
  
She flipped the top sheet over and shook her head.  
  
"Let's think about this. The eighties. Letter correspondence? Kinda early for wide-spread e-mail."  
  
Sydney flipped the top sheet back down and shook her head. "Hardly. The Military had ARPAnet in the 70s, and with the funding the Alliance had... They had e-mail capabilities."  
  
"You a computer science expert?" he asked.  
  
She pointed at the handwritten post-it and smiled. "Marshall."  
  
"Last chance to trade..."  
  
"Maybe next time," she said, approaching her desk. She stopped in mid-step when she saw all the boxes of information piled up around her chair.  
  
"See you in a week?" he teased.  
  
She whapped his chest lightly with her folder before finding her chair, and getting started.  
  
Rome, Italy  
  
Sixteen years, 11 Months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Crystal disembarked from the plane. She'd landed in the heart of Rome and was truly excited about her vacation. It was just like her childhood, she realized. Going off on her own, taking her adventures by herself. Sure, she missed Ian, but it would be her own educational experience.  
  
Except she frowned slightly when she headed towards the luggage pick- up. There was a familiar looking man crossing to her.  
  
It was Ian.  
  
"Hello, sweetheart," he said, forcing a smile as he reached her, slipping an arm around her.  
  
"Hi..."  
  
He kissed her cheek then whispered in her ear. "Just play along. There's been something that's come up."  
  
"What?" she asked quietly, smiling.  
  
"We have to make another flight."  
  
"Where?"  
  
"West Berlin. C'mon," he said, taking her carry-on.  
  
"Work?"  
  
"Sorry, love," he said.  
  
"My luggage?"  
  
"Leave it. We've got to move," he said, taking her to another terminal. "Our flight leaves in fifteen."  
  
"Bit of a close shave, isn't it?" she asked, allowing her hand to graze his cheek and chin.  
  
"At least I didn't nick myself," he said, smiling.  
  
"What's in Berlin?"  
  
"A wall."  
  
She smiled slightly. "That's not what I meant."  
  
"I'll tell you later," he whispered in her ear. "Too many other ears and eyes."  
  
She nodded, and the two soon boarded a plane bound for Germany. Crystal sighed as she sat down, buckling up. Ian could tell she was tired of travel, but there was little he could do about it. "I'm sorry, sweetheart."  
  
She smiled gently. "It's not like you planned this."  
  
He nodded, sliding her carry-on into the overhead compartment before sitting down beside her and buckling up as well. "It's a short hop, really, though."  
  
She nodded, allowing her head to rest on his shoulder.  
  
"There's my girl." He stretched his arm around her, his hand lightly tapping on her upper arm.  
  
It took her a moment to realize he was talking to her, softly tapping out Morse code on her skin.  
  
'K-Directorate in conjunction with the KGB.'  
  
She nodded, "snuggling" towards him to indicate she understood.  
  
'Sorry, love,' he tapped out. 'I know this was supposed to be your vacation.'  
  
"Mm-hmm."  
  
'Forgive me?'  
  
She looked up at him and smiled. Of course she did. It's not like it was his fault.  
  
He winked at her. "Close your eyes, sweetheart. Just rest. I'm right here." He added, in code, 'to protect you.'  
  
She rested her head on his shoulder again, quickly falling to sleep.  
  
Ian sighed heavily. Someday he was going to have to tell her the truth. Someday he'd stop lying to her.  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Morning  
  
He came into work whistling. It was going to be a good day. A great day. A perfect, magnificent day.  
  
His girlfriend was coming home the next day.  
  
All right, so he hadn't actually introduced her as his girlfriend to anyone, or even brought up the subject necessarily, but they were sort of dating. That meant she was his girlfriend, right? They even had pet names for each other and everything. She called him "Clark Kent" or "Sandman," while he opted for the occasional "Bond Babe," which often prompted her to shoot him a stinging look over the tops of her glasses.  
  
Very good day, Josh decided. He spotted his assistant. "Good morning, Donna."  
  
"Joshua."  
  
"Not so good a morning for you?" he asked, stopping by her cubicle.  
  
She glanced up at him. "Amy Gardner's called three times for you already."  
  
"It's not even eight yet."  
  
As if on cue, her telephone started to ring. Donna sighed heavily. "That's her."  
  
"How do you know?"  
  
"'Cause I know."  
  
"Pick it up."  
  
Donna answered: "Josh Lyman." She looked at him. "Yeah, he's right here." She held the phone out to him. "Amy Gardner," she said, affixing him with a level stare.  
  
He took the phone quickly. "Yeah?"  
  
"Jay," said Amy.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"I need to see you."  
  
"What about?"  
  
"Appropriations."  
  
"When?"  
  
"Before six."  
  
"I'm having dinner with the Congressional Democratic Caucus at six."  
  
"Uh-huh."  
  
"I'm not playing courier boy for you, Amy. You have your own staff. I don't work for you."  
  
"Just come?"  
  
"Tell me in three sentences why."  
  
"Congressman Wick is holding up money for the children's health initiative that the First Lady wants."  
  
"That's one. Why?"  
  
"National Security reasons. He won't tell us."  
  
"Then, sorry." Josh hung up and started for his office. "Bring me coffee?"  
  
"No," Donna called.  
  
"Figures," Josh muttered, closing his door.  
  
It's a time-honored resolution Because the danger is always near It's with you now But that ain't how it was supposed to be  
  
To be continued...  
  
Lines from the next installment:  
  
He smiled slightly when he heard the lock click open and quickly opened the heavy safe door, pulling out a black felt bag. Carefully pushing the bag down, he saw the thin, small sculpture. Checking the base, he nodded.  
  
It held the mark of Rambaldi. 


	2. Chapter 2 of 5

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.  
  
Previously, on the West Wing/Alias: Flashbacks abound. In the present, Josh and Crystal attend a memorial service at the Vietnam Wall while Crystal ponders her past. In 1986, she lived with boyfriend and CIA agent Ian Guthrie. A few days ago, Sydney and Vaughn were assigned the task of digging through the history of SD-6 in order to locate Sloane, and maybe even Irina Derevko, in the present. Also, Amy Gardner bugs Josh over an appropriations measure.  
  
I know you well enough to tell You've got your reasons That's not the kind of code you're inclined to break Some things unknown are best left alone forever And if a vow is what it takes Haven't you paid for your mistakes?  
  
West Berlin, Germany  
  
Sixteen years, Eleven months ago  
  
Evening  
  
Crystal looked at Ian with a frown. "I don't know. Something's not right."  
  
"What do you mean?" he asked, wiring an explosive device.  
  
"This doesn't sound right."  
  
"Crys, c'mon."  
  
"We're blowing something up. What's the big deal?" she asked.  
  
"Hand me that C-4?"  
  
She sighed, handing him the brick of plastic explosives.  
  
"I knew I should've told the DCI you weren't ready for this yet. It's just that he trusts you, y'know."  
  
"Ian. We're blowing something up. It's gonna take like two days. I don't even know why I'm here. I've not done anything. I could be touring the Parthenon right now."  
  
"You distract me enough, I'm going to blow up this apartment complex instead of the Embassy."  
  
"I just don't understand."  
  
"Crys. Sometimes you're not supposed to understand. Sometimes you're just supposed to do it."  
  
"You're doin' it just fine on your own."  
  
Their discussion was interrupted when the telephone rang.  
  
"Want me to get it?" she asked.  
  
He shook his head, prompting Crystal to flop back on the couch. She'd done absolutely nothing since arriving in West Berlin.  
  
Ian picked up the phone. "Ja?" he answered. He listened, glancing over at Crystal as she stared up at the ceiling, her arms crossed. He carried on a hushed conversation in German, knowing Crystal's German wasn't perfect.  
  
"Are you going to bring her in?" asked the voice on the other end of the phone, in English.  
  
"I don't know that she wants it," Ian admitted.  
  
"Ian, you were supposed to take care of this."  
  
"I'm working on it, sir," he said, picking up the base of the phone and taking it away from the table as far as the cord would reach.  
  
"You're obviously not working hard enough."  
  
"She's a kid, Sloane."  
  
"And I'm beginning to think the same thing about you."  
  
He sighed. "She's suspicious."  
  
"You're supposed to be better than this."  
  
"I'd like to see you do better."  
  
"Watch it, Ian. Because I'm watching you."  
  
"I'm going to blow up the damned Embassy and we're going to get the damned artifact. What more do you want from me?"  
  
"I want Crystal Seaborn if she's as good as you say she is."  
  
"She is."  
  
"And the hold up is...?"  
  
"She's a patriot."  
  
"'SD-6 is an extension of the CIA, a more covert branch. The Director wanted me to tell you that you're being promoted...' How hard is that going to be?"  
  
"Cut me some slack, would you?"  
  
"I'm thinking of cutting you from SD-6."  
  
"Y'know, I know where and how you operate, Sloane. I'm the guy tooling with C-4 right now."  
  
"I would love to see you try, Ian. I would love it."  
  
"Will you let me work?"  
  
"I expect results."  
  
"You'll get them."  
  
"I better."  
  
Ian sighed heavily, hanging up the phone. He carried it back to the table and dropped it unceremoniously, causing it to ring due to the jar.  
  
"What's going on?" Crystal asked, still stretched out on the couch, her arms crossed over her chest.  
  
"One of my contacts isn't happy. It's nothing new. He'll have to learn to live with it."  
  
"So, what now?"  
  
"I'm working on the bomb."  
  
"I'm going to sit here and twiddle my thumbs since that's all you'll let me do."  
  
"You're just so good at it, babe."  
  
She sighed heavily.  
  
He shook his head, sitting down to work on the wiring. "Y'know, I thought you wanted to be with me."  
  
"I do."  
  
"Then why are you complaining?"  
  
"Because you're the guy who pushed me for three days to get out, to take a break. The minute I get to Italy, you say, oh, sorry, babe, got this other thing we gotta do first."  
  
"Like you said. In two days we'll be done and I'll take you to Italy."  
  
"I really don't mind working. Just let me work. I'm not worried about burning out. I'm not worried about fatigue. I like this job, all right? I like protecting people."  
  
"Those people don't know you exist."  
  
"That's the beauty of it."  
  
"Yeah... And tomorrow night, I will need your help." He paused for a moment then looked up at her. "I've been talking with the Director about you."  
  
"And saying what?" she asked cautiously.  
  
"That I think you're too good for this branch of field work."  
  
She sat up and looked at him, tilting her head to one side. "What do you mean?"  
  
"There's another branch. More independent, more covert."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
He nodded. "And you'd be perfect for it."  
  
"What's the difference?"  
  
"It's based in California. It's more of a collection agency in a lot of ways. Location and procurement of important pieces of equipment, property... There's even some cooperation with other nations' security agencies."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
He nodded. "Little better pay, even."  
  
She smiled. "I don't do anything with the money I have now. I mean, I'm hardly ever home to use it. And with us sharing an apartment, I put two hundred towards rent and another hundred for food... and that's like it."  
  
"Think about it?"  
  
"Yeah, sure," she said with a shrug.  
  
"That's my girl."  
  
"Y'know, I'm not seventeen or anything."  
  
"Twenty-one."  
  
"Doesn't make me a little girl."  
  
"No... but you are mine."  
  
She laughed, flopping back down on the couch. "Work on your bomb."  
  
He looked at the makings of the incendiary device on the apartment's dining room table. "Think you'll have an answer in a week?" he asked, picking up a pair of pliers.  
  
"What?"  
  
"Your answer. Think you'll have it in a week."  
  
"What's the rush? Plus, if I leave before December, I don't get my degree."  
  
Damn. He'd forgotten about that. "Oh, yeah."  
  
"GWU's nice, y'know. I'm sure UCLA is, too, but... I'm not sure they'd give me my degree if I just take my last semester there."  
  
"Something else to think about."  
  
"Uh-huh."  
  
Ian sighed, and started to work again.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Yesterday  
  
Afternoon  
  
Sydney rubbed her eyes, turning the page in the file folder she currently had open on her desk. She'd been scanning e-mail messages sent decades ago. There was one particular recipient that seemed highly unusual. The e-mail address of the recipient was confusing, and she had already called for an audience with guru Marshall later. The address consisted of a name-Iggy-at an address made up of a string of numbers. Messages were often short, and Sydney was positive they were encoded. The messages appeared harmless enough, talking about the weather and about music.  
  
She wanted to know who Iggy was.  
  
And curiosity was really starting to get the better of her.  
  
Finding another e-mail to "Iggy," she pulled it out of the main file and placed it in another folder. Frowning, she grabbed a spare sheet of paper, determined to decipher the message inside.  
  
She worked for an hour, at least, on the one message, trying whatever came to mind: using the first letter of each word, the last letter. Going by the date, she skipped letters accordingly. She used letter replacement. She rearranged letters, words.  
  
She kept coming up empty.  
  
Her frustration level was rising--she should be able to crack this. It was Sloane, after all, a man she *knew*.  
  
Coming up with gibberish again, she cursed under her breath, crumpling up the paper and hurling it at a garbage can across the room.  
  
"Did you play softball in past life?" Vaughn asked, admiring her throwing arm.  
  
She looked up at him, shaking her head, and sort of calming down.  
  
"You okay?"  
  
"Iggy."  
  
"Icky?" he asked, unsure if he'd heard correctly.  
  
"No. Iggy. Some guy Sloane was in contact with frequently in the eighties."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
"I know all of these are in code, but I can't crack them..."  
  
"Why don't you get the computers to work on them? Give the Cryptologists something to chew on for a while?"  
  
She nodded. "I just... There's something about this guy. This Iggy person." She sighed, looking up at him. "How goes your mission?"  
  
Vaughn blinked then unrolled a large piece of paper across her desk. It was a massive web of blue lines. "CIA operations through the 80s." He then unrolled a transparency, with a web of red lines. "SD-6 operations through the 80s."  
  
Sydney took a moment to look over the information splayed out in front of her. "There doesn't appear to be too much overlap. Just random areas where someone from CIA was coming in as SD-6 was going out or vice versa."  
  
"Looks that way at first," acknowledged Vaughn. "But check out these..." With a dry-erase marker, he circled areas where the two missions coincided perfectly. "With turn around times including briefing and debriefing, travel... These missions are spaced and concentrated in certain areas, where it could theoretically be one person's work. Or a partnership or group."  
  
"Do you know who were on these missions?" she asked, looking up at him.  
  
Vaughn shook his head. "No, I just have dates and locations. Dixon's got part of the break down, I think Weiss has some more..."  
  
"Go find out who's on these. See if there's an Iggy somehow... I'm going to take some of these e-mails to Cryptology." With that, Sydney stood, rolled up his flowcharts, and picked up the file she'd been gathering on "Iggy."  
  
Vaughn watched as Sydney breezed past him, heading down the corridor.  
  
West Berlin, Germany  
  
Sixteen years, eleven months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Crystal stood at the gate of the Embassy, her dark hair pulled back, a frantic look on her face. "Please," she begged in perfect French. "I think someone stole my passport and I have to get home, my flight leaves tomorrow... I can give you numbers you can call at home, to check my identity. You can check my student enrollment at the university... Please!"  
  
In a green jumpsuit, with a patch over his right pocket, Ian approached the gate as well, holding a large toolbox. "Gunter Air Conditioning," he said, holding up an identification badge as well as a work order.  
  
"About time," muttered the guard, opening the gate. "Come through."  
  
Ian started to enter, and Crystal was on his heels.  
  
The guard stopped her, grabbing her arm, as Ian continued on. "You'll have to wait for an escort inside," he told her.  
  
She nodded dutifully.  
  
Ian entered the Embassy, setting his toolbox on the front desk. "Gunter Air," he said, handing the staffer the work order.  
  
The young man looked up at him and smiled. "Finally. It's been unbearable here."  
  
Ian smiled. He and Crystal had actually been by the Embassy once before--a few days earlier, sabotaging the air conditioning system. "It is warm," he acknowledged.  
  
"Hot," corrected the staffer.  
  
"Won't be for long," assured Ian.  
  
"Down the hall, up the stairs," instructed the employee.  
  
Ian tipped his baseball cap, heading down the hall and up the stairs. He heard his girlfriend's familiar voice as he started to climb the stairs. Her job was to keep the staff downstairs distracted while he eased into a storage room. He quickly crossed to a safe--one he'd located when in the Embassy earlier, and opened his tool box, pulling out his lock picking tools, listening for the familiar tumbler clicks as he slowly rotated the dial. He smiled slightly when he heard the lock click open and quickly opened the heavy safe door, pulling out a black felt bag. Carefully pushing the bag down, he saw the thin, small sculpture. Checking the base, he nodded.  
  
It held the mark of Rambaldi.  
  
Securing it in the false bottom of his toolbox, he closed the safe and quickly exited the storage room. "Working" on the air conditioning unit actually meant implanting the bomb, although he did reconnect the wires they had disconnected a few days earlier. He smiled again as the air conditioner roared to life. Setting the timer on the bomb quickly, he replaced the cover, picked up his toolbox, and headed down the stairs.  
  
"We'll bill you for services rendered," Ian told the man at the front desk.  
  
He nodded, watching Crystal rant and rave at a consular official.  
  
"Floor show?" Ian asked.  
  
"Lost her passport."  
  
"Some people." He shook his head before leaving.  
  
Crystal, meanwhile, had to finish out her part of the deal. Taking her purse, she dumped the contents out on a desk, still ranting about the staff being particularly rude and anything but helpful.  
  
The official stopped her in mid rant, by selecting the passport from the debris her purse had made. "I believe this is your stolen passport."  
  
Crystal snatched it out of his hand and opened it. Her shoulders drooped slightly before she wordlessly tossed her belongings back in her purse and hightailed it out of the building.  
  
A few blocks from the Embassy, she jumped into the back of Ian's Gunter Air and Cooling truck. "Did you get it?"  
  
He nodded. "Any trouble with you?"  
  
"No, we're clear," she said, glancing back at the Embassy as Ian put the truck into gear and drove off.  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Morning  
  
Josh watched as the rest of the Senior Staff and aides filed out of the Chief of Staff's office. He lingered by the conference table, approaching his boss as the office emptied out. Leo McGarry glanced up. "Yeah?"  
  
"You got a minute?"  
  
"Probably two," he said with a nod, continuing to pack up files he'd been looking at during the meeting. "What's up?"  
  
"What is it with a lack of understanding on the chain of command the part of new staffers brought in to fill gaps?" Josh asked.  
  
"Is this hypothetical or is your anger aimed at someone?" he asked.  
  
"Remember Mandy? She was supposed to report to me or Toby and what did she do--?"  
  
"You want to spend your two minutes rehashing about a staffer who hasn't worked here in four years?"  
  
"Amy Gardner."  
  
Leo glanced up at his deputy for a moment then looked back down. "What's up with Amy Gardner?"  
  
"Apparently the First Lady is upset over budgetary changes and she apparently called Donna two dozen times this morning to get to me so I could somehow talk to Chris Wick and get him to fall inline with her policy wishes."  
  
"What's going on with Wick?"  
  
"He's introduced legislation that would take money away from the children's health initiatives and put it towards National Security."  
  
Leo stopped what he was doing and looked up again. "National Security?"  
  
"Yeah. That's what Amy said."  
  
"Find out what kind of 'National Security' matters he's talking about."  
  
"Leo--"  
  
"Look, if it's going to cause a rift where the First Lady's gonna come out and say our party sucks, I'd rather avoid that at all costs especially when you know Wick and can smack him upside the head. You did it once, you should do it again."  
  
"It'll look like I'm taking up the First Lady's cause, and if there's a problem with the First Lady's office, it should be handled by the First Lady because it makes Amy look like she can't run it and it degrades me."  
  
"I'm not sure *why* Wick's doing this. Find out what the money's going to. You've got the clearance to figure that much out, don't you?"  
  
"Yeah, but..."  
  
"Call Wick as a personal favor. You don't want to do that, call CIA or NSA or whomever and see if they know if they're getting a budgetary increase."  
  
"I could do that..."  
  
"Figure it out."  
  
Josh nodded. "Yes, sir," he said, turning to go.  
  
West Berlin, Germany  
  
Sixteen years, eleven months ago  
  
Evening  
  
Crystal watched footage of the Embassy in partial ruin on the television. She tried to ignore the death toll, and turned away when the news station started running pictures of the dead.  
  
Ian crossed to the television set and turned it off. "I don't see why you have to torture yourself with watching stuff like that."  
  
"I don't see how you can't be even the slightest bit curious about what kind of damage we do."  
  
"It's not damage. We're protecting people, remember?"  
  
"That wasn't protection. That was destruction."  
  
"Of the enemy. What that newscast isn't telling you is about the terrorist ties the members of that embassy had."  
  
"Yeah..." she said quietly.  
  
He sighed, dropping onto the couch beside her. "This may not be the best of times to bring it up, but have you thought anymore about being upgraded? Moving to California?"  
  
"A little, but, Ian, you asked me yesterday."  
  
"I know."  
  
"I mean... If I have to make the call today, then I'm not ready for it yet. Let me finish my degree and then we can go at Christmas. Be in sunny California for the worst part of the D.C. winter."  
  
Ian nodded slowly. "I may go on now."  
  
"What?" she asked, looking at him.  
  
"I don't think I can wait."  
  
"It's six months if that, Ian."  
  
"It's six months I could have a settled apartment, I could know the region--"  
  
"It's L.A. I know that region like the back of my hand. We could go together, find a place *together*. I moved into your apartment in D.C., too. Do I get a say in anything in this relationship?"  
  
"You're saying you're going to stay in D.C. until December."  
  
"Six months. What's wrong with that?"  
  
"It's a long time."  
  
"You were the one yesterday saying, 'don't you want to be with me? Why are you complaining? We're together...' What the *hell* happened to that?"  
  
"I've been doing this job a lot longer than you have, Crystal, and I need the advancement. I don't know if they'll take me in six months."  
  
"Oh, c'mon! You've gotta be kidding me. You're one of the best, everyone says so. You waiting six months isn't going to do a bit of damage to your ability to be promoted."  
  
"A lot can happen in six months, Crystal. I could die, for one. I could be injured, I could... who knows what, a thousand bad things could happen. If I get transferred to California, making more money and if something happens *then*, then it'll be *fine*! I'll have the means to take care of myself. I'll have the means to take care of you."  
  
"Perhaps you haven't realized in all this time you've gotten to know me, Ian, but I can damn well take care of myself!"  
  
"Crystal--"  
  
"Look, you want to go, that's fine. Go. I'm going to finish my degree first. And maybe a little time apart would be best."  
  
"Crys, I..."  
  
"You were the one sayin' you were gonna go without me, buster. You brought up this whole moving-to-California thing in the first place. You tell the Director, next time you see him, that I'm finishing my degree. I think I can best serve the CIA and the people with letters behind my name."  
  
He nodded slowly. "Fine. Listen. I'm going back home to debrief. You should go on to Italy."  
  
"For what's left of my vacation. Wonderful," she said sarcastically.  
  
"Don't do this, Crystal."  
  
"I'm not doing anything. You're the one moving to California. You're the one who said: 'Crystal, take a vacation.' You're the one coming and getting me before I could even reach my destination. You're the one calling the shots. And you call your own shots just fine, so I'm gonna call mine."  
  
He stood, his intense eyes meeting hers. "Fine," he said coldly. So cold it made Crystal's spine tingle.  
  
After the moment passes And the impulse disappears You can still hold back because You don't crack very easily  
  
Stay tuned...  
  
Lines from the next installment:  
  
"Do you remember an SD-6 mole named Ian?"  
  
"A mole in SD-6? I believe that was only the two of us."  
  
"No, for SD-6 in the CIA."  
  
"There were no SD-6 moles in the CIA." 


	3. Chapter 3 of 5

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.  
  
Previously, on the West Wing/Alias: Years ago, Crystal and Ian blow up an Embassy in Germany, but before the building goes, Ian retrieves a Rambaldi artifact. Ian tries to get her to join the "more advanced" branch of the CIA in California, but that only erupts into an argument. In more recent times, Sydney gets frustrated over e-mails sent from Sloane to "Iggy" and Vaughn seems to have found areas where CIA and SD-6 operations overlap. Josh gets suckered into an assignment he turned down from Amy but Leo makes him take-finding out what Congressman Wick wants with money for "National Security."  
  
And you still have a rage inside you That you carry with a certain pride In the only part of a broken heart That you could ever save  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Yesterday  
  
Afternoon  
  
Sydney watched as Dixon poured through files. She, Dixon and Vaughn had taken over a conference room in the CIA headquarters, allowing Vaughn to have his flowcharts flat on the table. Dixon frowned slightly, finally finding a file and tossing it onto the table. "What's next?"  
  
"Case number D-9873NH," Vaughn read, marking through another circle with his dry-erase marker.  
  
While Dixon got to work sifting through the file boxes, Sydney poured through the case file he'd just removed. She'd glanced through the other fifteen quickly, to see what jumped out at her. She sighed slightly. "Same agent number, same informational stats blacked out."  
  
"Are we still backtracking the agent number?" Vaughn asked, glancing at her.  
  
Sydney nodded. "Weiss is in there with Marshall as we speak."  
  
Dixon tossed another file onto the table. "Next?"  
  
As Vaughn read off another number, Sydney closed the one she'd been looking at and grabbed the newest one. As Dixon sifted, Vaughn picked up the one she'd just tossed away and started casually flipping through its contents. "Uh... Sydney?"  
  
"Hm?" she asked, not looking up.  
  
"They missed a spot..."  
  
"What?" she asked, glancing up at him.  
  
"I think this is Iggy."  
  
"What do you mean?" she asked.  
  
He showed her the document in the file. "He initialed it... And they didn't mark it out."  
  
Initials were clearly visible in the upper left hand corner of one of the pages. The initials were IG.  
  
Sydney stood. "Can I have that file please?"  
  
Vaughn handed it over. "Where are you going?" he asked as she started for the door.  
  
"Keep looking!" she said, exiting the conference room and making a beeline for her father's office. "Dad?"  
  
"Sydney?" he asked.  
  
"You have a minute?"  
  
He nodded, and she sat across from his desk.  
  
"In the early days of SD-6, with you and Sloane... Do you remember anyone by the name of Iggy?"  
  
Jack Bristow arched an eyebrow. "Iggy?"  
  
"Yes."  
  
"I don't recall any Iggy's off the top of my head, no."  
  
"What about someone with the initials IG?" she asked.  
  
"IG?"  
  
She opened the file, showing him the initials that were not blackened.  
  
"I'm not sure, Sydney, but I think maybe... Why don't you leave me this file, and let me call Langley. I should be able to get you an answer by the end of the day."  
  
She nodded. "Thanks, Dad."  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Night  
  
Ian sat alone, in total darkness, on the couch in his apartment, staring off into nothingness. He pondered his choices, his decisions that had brought him to his current state.  
  
What was he thinking, trying to get her involved? What was he thinking, extolling her virtues to Arvin Sloane?  
  
Those decisions, however, were made, and there was no way to undo the damage they'd caused.  
  
A more pressing question was who was scratching at his apartment door. Quietly easing off the couch, he stood, grabbing his gun from the side table; he stealthily crossed to the door. Silently, he worked the chain lock back from its locked position, ready for whoever wanted entry. When the door started to open, Ian grabbed the intruder, slamming them against the wall, his hand at their throat, his gun to their head.  
  
"Ian, please!" Crystal whispered hoarsely. He could see fear in her wide eyes, total panic.  
  
This was not the girl he knew, the girl who barely flinched. "Crystal?" he asked, still restraining her.  
  
"Please," she begged, a pair of tears starting to roll down her cheeks.  
  
He backed off. "What the hell are you--you weren't supposed to be home for two more days!"  
  
"I couldn't stay over there," she said, trying to calm her breathing. She put a hand over her eyes, hoping to get rid of all the tears in a hurry.  
  
Ian reached out into the hallway and grabbed her luggage, bringing it inside and locking the door behind him before turning on the faint hallway light. "Why didn't you call me?"  
  
"I was thinking, the whole drive over here, I... I didn't figure you'd try to kill me when I came in!"  
  
"You should know better than to sneak up on me!"  
  
"Christ, Ian!"  
  
"I'm sorry!"  
  
She nodded, slowly pushing herself off the wall and into his arms for a hug. "I've been thinking..."  
  
"Yeah?" he asked, his arms around her.  
  
"I'm not that far from graduation, I'll try to finish up the classes in the second summer term. We'll go in August..."  
  
He gently stroked her hair, sighing a little. "Okay."  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Morning  
  
Josh stopped at Donna's desk en route to his office after his meeting with Leo. "Can you get me Congressman Wick on the phone please?"  
  
She looked up, and nodded. "Sure."  
  
He entered his office, flopping down on his chair with a sigh. His ex-girlfriend's errant boy? He was not happy with this turn of events. He drummed his fingers, waiting for Donna to come in and say that his old college buddy was on the phone. After a few minutes, Donna did appear at his door, but it wasn't to tell him his call was waiting.  
  
"He's not in."  
  
"Not in?" asked Josh.  
  
She shook her head. "And his staff is unsure of when he'll be in."  
  
"He's avoiding us," Josh said, shaking his head. "Okay, thanks." He started flipping through his Rolodex, finding Wick's cellular phone number and dialing it.  
  
He glanced up as Donna slipped out, closing all doors to his office. She could tell her boss was not a happy camper.  
  
He listened to the rings, and then the answer: "Wick."  
  
"Chris, it's Josh."  
  
There was silence on the other end.  
  
"Yeah, you've stepped in it buddy, and this time I'm there with you."  
  
"What is it?" he asked.  
  
"National Security money."  
  
"I can't talk about it," said the Congressman, quickly deflecting his old college pal.  
  
"Sure you can."  
  
"Over a cell phone?"  
  
"Tell me where you are and I'll call you back on a landline."  
  
"I'll call you--"  
  
"Yeah, never. Not falling for it, Chris. Tell me."  
  
"Look, I can't. Take it up with the DCI."  
  
"Conrad?" asked Josh.  
  
"Josh, I gotta run."  
  
He sighed. "Fine." With that, he pushed the plunger, ending the call before thinking for a moment. He dialed another number, listening to the rings.  
  
"Seaborn's office," answered a harried voice.  
  
"Hey, Melissa, it's Josh."  
  
Crystal's assistant smiled slightly. "Hey. She's not in yet..."  
  
"Yeah, I know, I just... I have a question or two for you."  
  
"Okay..." she said. "What can I do for you?"  
  
"Is there any Company scuttlebutt about an increase in budget?"  
  
"Rumors, y'mean? None that I've heard. But I'm sort of removed from the administrative levels. I pull records, make airline reservations..."  
  
"She's still set to arrive on time tomorrow?"  
  
She smiled. "Should be. I'm sure she'll be thrilled to see you."  
  
"I hope so. Listen, can you do me a favor?"  
  
"What's that?"  
  
"Patch me through to Conrad's office?"  
  
"You bet."  
  
He listened as the hold message stated someone would be with him shortly, tapping an ink pen on his desk. Exchanging appropriate pleasantries with CIA Director Rob Conrad's assistant, he was soon put through to the Director of Central Intelligence himself. "Director, it's Josh Lyman."  
  
"What'cha need, Josh, we're kinda busy over here."  
  
"Congressman Wick's holding up appropriations measures, saying something about national security measures and he's rather... silent about the whole thing."  
  
"You're calling me about appropriations? Josh, let me refer you to our accounting office and I gotta go."  
  
With that, the call ended and Josh looked at the handset. Shaking his head, he hung up.  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Crystal arrived at the apartment earlier than usual, one of her afternoon classes cancelled, much to her delight. Checking the mail, she was alarmed to see a padded envelope with no return address, marked to Ian. Chewing on her lower lip slightly, she carefully carried the package into the apartment. She dropped the bills and junk mail onto the kitchen cabinet, letting her backpack slide off her shoulder.  
  
Upon closer inspection, she noticed that the postage had been cancelled in California. Knowing Ian wouldn't be home for a few more hours, she set the package on the kitchen table, sitting down in front of it. It worried her, the lack of return address. She licked her lips slightly, leaning in to listen to the package--just in case. Hearing nothing, she weighed the package and tried to ascertain what could possibly be inside. It weighed very little...  
  
Deathly curious, and knowing full well curiosity may kill the cat, she steamed the envelope open.  
  
To her surprise, inside was only a black audiotape with three characters written on the label: "SD-6."  
  
Frowning slightly, she thought about popping it in the tape player and listening. She figured, however, that she'd chanced it enough and, knowing her luck, it'd be like Mission: Impossible and disintegrate before her very eyes once she listened to the message.  
  
With a sigh, she returned the tape to the envelope and resealed it. Gathering up all the mail, she took it back out to the mailbox, to leave it for Ian to find.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Yesterday  
  
Afternoon  
  
Marshall looked up as Sydney approached. "Hey," he said. "I got the list."  
  
She smiled, pulling a chair up to sit beside him. "Yeah? And the verdict?"  
  
"I sorted the names by initials and hit a list of about thirty five active agents with the initials IG, with the I either in the first or middle position who've been working since the Company since the eighties."  
  
"That's manageable."  
  
"Considering how many there are otherwise." Marshall let out a breath. "We have quite the employee listing."  
  
She smiled slightly. "I'm sure. What can you tell me about the e- mails to Iggy?"  
  
"The thing about the address with the numbers... this was before domains where it's like 'Sydney@CIA.gov' or whatever. Instead, it was a list of numbers, ranging from zero to two-fifty-five separated by periods. It's... It's really hard to trace. All those numbers were registered and you have to run a reverse DNS. All numbers had to be registered, now whether or not they register with their actual name, y'know, that's another story. That information can easily be falsified. Even with the tracings... you can fake the IP address. It's totally do-able. I've done it myself." He smiled proudly for a moment. "But if you physically look at the path the e-mail took, you wouldn't be able to tell where the information came from. The whole tracing thing was quite difficult because there was an encapsulation process."  
  
"Encapsulation?" Sydney asked, frowning slightly.  
  
"It's like putting the e-mail in an envelope... and putting that envelope in another envelope... until the message is hidden in seven different envelopes. The message starts at the home server and jumps to another server, where it loses the top few envelopes and gains a few more. To trace it... you simply run it backwards from the receiver to the hop before and pick up the envelopes it lost."  
  
"How long will it take to trace?" she asked, eager to get the process started.  
  
"That's just it." He watched as Sydney's shoulders drooped slightly. "The servers dump garbage data just like you throw out used, empty envelopes. Given that it's been twenty years since these e-mails were sent... those envelopes are long since gone."  
  
"There's no way to trace it?"  
  
Marshall shook his head.  
  
"Great," Sydney said quietly.  
  
Jack approached the table. "Did you get the agent listing?" he asked.  
  
Marshall looked up and nodded. "Thirty five agents might be our mysterious IG."  
  
"Any names jump out at you?" Jack asked, scanning the list himself.  
  
Sydney looked at the screen on Marshall's computer. "Not really."  
  
Jack nodded slightly. "Run the list to see if any of these agents have red flags, disciplinary actions against them."  
  
Sydney looked up at him. "You sure?"  
  
"No. But I'd start with them."  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Morning  
  
Josh ushered the representative from the NSA out of his office. The National Security Agency agent had no idea what was going on with the money Chris Wick was trying to earmark for security purposes. With a sigh, he looked at Donna. "I still have time, right?"  
  
Checking his schedule, she nodded.  
  
"I'm going to make a call. Unless there's a major and I mean major crisis... No interruptions."  
  
"All right..." she said, watching as he retreated to his office and closed the door.  
  
Josh sat at his desk and picked up the phone, dialing a number he'd memorized. "Helen, it's Josh Lyman; I need to speak to him again."  
  
The Director of Central Intelligence's secretary seemed to hesitate for a moment. "Sir--"  
  
"Is he still busy?"  
  
"Not exactly."  
  
"I'm on your side here. I just need to know what's going on to keep the First Lady from cracking down on your boss and mine."  
  
"Please hold."  
  
"Thanks, Helen," he said, again listening to the automated voice that said someone would be on the line shortly to talk to him.  
  
The next voice he heard was that of Director Conrad. "Josh."  
  
"Director. I trust things are calmer?"  
  
"More or less. What can I do for you?"  
  
"What's up with appropriations? I've talked to the NSA; I've talked to Military Intelligence. They know nothing about budgetary increases, although they'd certainly like them. What's going on? Why wasn't the White House notified of the needs?"  
  
"It's really not that much money that we're requesting, but it is necessary."  
  
"For what?"  
  
"For matters pertaining to national security."  
  
"That much I've got, sir. As I was telling your assistant, help me help you. Or else the First Lady's going to have all our heads."  
  
"It's... pertinent that this stays in the governmental realm. If this leaks... We can't stand another intelligence failure. With the whole Kundu thing reaching the boiling point, two media happenings within weeks of each other... We're the CIA. We work best with cloak and dagger and I'm doing my best to keep us in the dark."  
  
Josh smiled slightly. "You mean cloak rooms. You brought in Wick."  
  
"We didn't want to rumble with the First Lady."  
  
"Too late."  
  
"Josh..."  
  
"I'm serious, man, the First Lady is furious. I've had her Chief of Staff calling my office three to four times an hour. I'm starting to get really frustrated with this whole thing myself. You should've come to us first, because we would've been able to settle the First Lady's ruffled feathers. As it is now... you bypassed the executive branch entirely. That's not reflecting well on you, cloak, dagger or neither."  
  
"I'll forward the proposal we gave Wick by courier to the White House."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"And I'll make the First Lady a deal."  
  
"What kind of deal?"  
  
"With the bill, I'll send a personal letter if you wouldn't mind making sure the letter gets to Mrs. Bartlet personally?"  
  
"All right. Hey, listen, before I let you go..."  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"That morning crisis... It didn't have anything to do with Crys, did it?"  
  
"I have to go, Josh."  
  
The Deputy Chief of Staff sighed when he heard the line go dead. That probably wasn't good.  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Ian sat on the couch in the apartment he shared with Crystal, working on the latest mission from home while Crystal was in the middle of summer school classes when his telephone rang. When he answered, a gruff voice ran over his greeting.  
  
"Where are you with Ms. Seaborn?"  
  
"Sloane..."  
  
"Well?"  
  
"I'm working on it."  
  
"Which means... there's been no progress."  
  
"Yes, there has been. She's trying to finish her degree here before moving to California. She wants to finish and she was going to wait until the fall semester but is working her tail off to get it done by August."  
  
"You're stalling."  
  
"I'm not going to drug her, fly her to L.A., set her up in SD-6 and say, here y'go, sweetie, your new job when she's weeks away from commencement."  
  
"We have schools in L.A."  
  
"She doesn't want her diploma from any of them."  
  
"Ian--"  
  
"She thinks George Washington will give her a better education than UCLA. Plus the fact... she's still a staunch loyalist. Loyal to the CIA, to her country, her school... This is not going to be an easy get."  
  
"I want her latest CIA stats."  
  
"Hack them."  
  
"No, I want you to get them for me. From Langley."  
  
"Sloane..."  
  
"By Monday."  
  
Ian sighed slightly. "I'll get them before the end of the week."  
  
"Good."  
  
Ian slammed the phone down.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Yesterday  
  
Afternoon  
  
"Sydney!"  
  
She looked up as Marshall came scurrying towards her desk. "I ran into my friend from Cryptology and they broke the code from the e-mails."  
  
She stood from her desk as he handed her the information he'd picked up. Scanning quickly, she exhaled. "This guy's a mole. For SD-6 in the CIA."  
  
"They're still working on the others, but there's his first name," he said, pointing to the three letter combination at the bottom. "Ian."  
  
"I don't remember having an Ian on our list..." She looked up at him. "What about the other e-mails?"  
  
"They're finishing them up and they'll get them to you as soon as possible."  
  
She smiled. "Thank you." Sitting back down at her desk, she consulted the list of thirty-five she had and, again, came up empty with an Ian. Carrying the e-mail and the list, she headed towards her father's desk. "Dad?"  
  
He was typing on his computer and didn't look up. "Yes?"  
  
"Do you remember an SD-6 mole named Ian?"  
  
"A mole in SD-6? I believe that was only the two of us."  
  
"No, for SD-6 in the CIA."  
  
"There were no SD-6 moles in the CIA."  
  
She presented him with the e-mail. "I just got this decrypted. This message was from Sloane to someone named Ian, whose e-mail prefix was Iggy. Sloane says, and I quote, 'you promised me the employee file by Friday. It's now Monday and I still don't have it. Is Langley too hard to break into from the inside?' Dad, who was on the inside?"  
  
He scanned the e-mail, then looked up at her. "I don't know. I don't ever remember there being a mole in the CIA for us."  
  
"Dad..."  
  
"No mole. Move on. I know for a fact there are more e-mails Sloane sent to people with other names than Iggy."  
  
"Right," she said, fighting a sigh. Taking the e-mail, she returned to her desk. She drummed her fingers on her desk, waiting for the file from Cryptology.  
  
Ian.  
  
Iggy.  
  
He had to be someone.  
  
When the file arrived, she quickly tore through the information, coming up with a last name.  
  
Guthrie.  
  
She picked up the phone, dialing the Langley office, and the extension of her only real contact in D.C.  
  
"Seaborn's office."  
  
"Melissa? This is Sydney Bristow, is Crystal in?"  
  
"I'm sorry, Agent Bristow, she's currently unavailable."  
  
"She's overseas?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
Sydney sighed. "When will she be back?"  
  
"Actually, she's set to fly in tomorrow, with a layover at LAX."  
  
"How long's the layover?"  
  
"Several hours."  
  
"Melissa, can you give me her flight information? She shouldn't stay at the airport that whole time... I'd like to take her out for coffee or lunch or something..."  
  
"Sure, let me forward the information to you encrypted."  
  
She smiled. "Wonderful."  
  
But you've been through it once, you know how it ends You don't see the point of going through it again And this ain't the time, and this ain't the place And neither's any other day  
  
Stay tuned...  
  
Lines from the next installment:  
  
Crystal looked at the building with a frown. "A bank?"  
  
"C'mon," said Ian. "Hazard pay. Gotta invest somewhere."  
  
"I've never heard of Credit Dauphine. First American, sure, but..."  
  
"They're the best," he said, leading her in. "An off-shoot from a Swiss bank." 


	4. Chapter 4 of 5

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.  
  
Previously, on the West Wing/Alias: Sydney scrambles to find any connection between Iggy and SD-6/CIA operations. Marshall informs her that there's no way to backtrack the e-mails after twenty years, but they have a list of agents from the eighties, and whittles down the file by initials until there are only thirty-five possible agents. Sydney puts together that Iggy is actually Ian, who's a mole for SD-6 in the CIA. Upon learning his last name, she tries to call Crystal for a little assistance only to learn she's overseas but will be arriving in California the next day on her flight home. Josh has to jump through hoops in order to figure out what the National Security money is for, and it's for the expensive Alliance operation. All the while in the past, Crystal and Ian make a deal after she comes home from her Italy trip early and both wind up scaring each other-she finishes school in August, they'll go to California together. Crystal, when Ian's away, lets curiosity get the better of her and opens a package addressed to him only to learn it's an audio tape with "SD-6" printed on it. Ian gets a call from Sloane for Crystal's CIA stats.  
  
But you swore to yourself a long time ago There were some things that people Never needed to know This is one that you keep That you bury so deep No one can tear it out  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Morning  
  
Arvin Sloane sat at his desk in his office, flipping through a file folder. When he happened upon a headshot, he removed it from the file, looking at the dark haired young woman, with green eyes and glasses.  
  
He was looking at Crystal Seaborn.  
  
His door opened, and Jack Bristow appeared. "Good, Jack. I'm glad you came. We may have a new prospect but I'm still wondering about our inside man."  
  
"I was worried when you said he was our man in the CIA. He's a bit of a maverick, a bit unstable."  
  
"He's our kind of guy," insisted Sloane. "And his characteristics make him obvious for the suspect and therefore the CIA will say he's too easy a target."  
  
"Then, why are we considering changing our inside source?"  
  
"Because," Sloane said. "If he doesn't get her, he won't come either." He slid the picture of Crystal cross the desk to Jack. "She's the type of person we need. She's athletic, from an aristocratic background. She made a solid split from her family when she joined the CIA with no ties to others except... Ian Guthrie. We eliminate him once she's on our side and we step in as her new family. The kinder, gentler CIA."  
  
"What are his chances of bringing her in?"  
  
"At this point... Slim. He's stalling till August. What do you think about the girl?" Sloane asked, offering him the file.  
  
Jack took it, sitting down and examining her career highlights and background. "Her father and uncle are prominent attorneys, her father in D.C., her uncle in Orange County."  
  
"Your point?"  
  
"Seems like she spent an awful lot of time at her uncle's."  
  
"She spent an awful lot of time with her father as well, but she's had no contact with him since her high school graduation."  
  
"I don't know. I think that if we start recruiting heavily from the CIA they're going to figure out where we are."  
  
"I'm not talking about recruiting heavily. The occasional agent is who I'm after. She slipped past Project Christmas, but she'd be perfect. She needs a little work on some of her languages, but if she does get her psychology degree from GWU, I think we need her."  
  
Jack nodded slowly.  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Afternoon  
  
Josh came back from the mess after lunch and stopped by Donna's desk. "Did I get a courier visit while I was gone?"  
  
"Courier? No..."  
  
"No package?"  
  
She shook her head.  
  
"Great," he said, sighing. "Call out front and see if anybody's been by, would you?"  
  
Donna picked up the phone, having a quick conversation with a security agent at the gate while Josh leaned against the glass partition that separated her office from the hallway. "Nothing? All right, thanks."  
  
Before she could tell him the news, he was already headed down the hall. He'd heard quite enough.  
  
"Josh?"  
  
He held a hand up, to indicate he'd heard, and had heard quite enough. He stopped at Margaret's desk. "He in?"  
  
"He's with Nancy McNally right now."  
  
"Know if they're talking about the budget?"  
  
"No... why?"  
  
"Because I'm getting really tired of the run-around."  
  
"On the budget?"  
  
"Yeah. And matters of national security. I'm less than pleased with our intelligence people at the moment."  
  
"I thought you were in love with an intelligence person."  
  
Josh had started to form the next part of his rant but that comment stopped him dead in his tracks. "We're just sorta... not exactly in a relationship. Exactly."  
  
"Right."  
  
"She's got nothing to do with this, she's leaps and bounds above my current beef with the intelligence community."  
  
"All right."  
  
"Who told you I was in love with her?"  
  
"No one told me."  
  
"Then how did you..."  
  
"I see the way you look at her."  
  
"I... Care about her..." He struggled to get the words out.  
  
"I'm not the one you should be telling that to," she said with a knowing look.  
  
Josh sighed slightly as the door to Leo's office opened, and the Chief of Staff was guiding Nancy McNally, the National Security Advisor out of the room.  
  
"Josh," she said.  
  
"Dr. McNally." He nodded. "Ma'am, you wouldn't know anything about more appropriations for national security, would you?"  
  
She tilted her head to one side. "You're offering us more money?"  
  
"Congressman Wick is."  
  
"We'll take every penny you'll give us."  
  
"I think it's for the CIA, although... I'm beginning to wonder about it."  
  
"Have you talked to Robby?" she asked, referring to the DCI.  
  
"Twice. He said he was going to forward me some information and... That was hours ago."  
  
"Can't help you," she said, shaking her head.  
  
"Thank you, ma'am."  
  
She offered a smile, and said her last goodbyes to Leo before continuing on her way.  
  
"Still nothing?" Leo asked.  
  
"Nada. I think I've been snookered by the CIA director."  
  
"Well, he used to be a field operative," Leo said, retreating into his office.  
  
Josh followed. "I don't know who else to call. I've talked with their accountants, their money people... Nobody's saying anything."  
  
"You don't have an agent you're friendly with?"  
  
"Yeah, she's overseas..."  
  
Leo looked at his deputy. "Sam's cousin."  
  
"She'll be back tomorrow, though."  
  
"When's your dinner with the Congressional Democratic Caucus?"  
  
"Tonight. Caviling over chicken, I think."  
  
"Bring it up at dinner, see what you can shake out of the Leadership."  
  
"Amy wanted me to bring it up at dinner..."  
  
"Well, now I do."  
  
"Are you two in cahoots or something?"  
  
"Please," Leo said, sitting down at his desk.  
  
Josh sighed. "All right."  
  
Moscow, Soviet Union  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Night  
  
Ian pulled on his leather jacket. "You'll be all right?" he asked, looking at Crystal.  
  
She was settled at the small desk with her Psychology book. "Why wouldn't I be? I'm starved; go get dinner. I need brain food."  
  
"I'm going," he said with a smile, kissing the top of her head. "Keep studying." Making sure she was still engrossed in her book, he picked up a briefcase silently.  
  
"I hate summer terms..."  
  
"Be back soon," he said, grabbing his keys and heading for the door to the small apartment they'd taken up residency in for the mission.  
  
"You'd better!"  
  
Ian smiled, and locked her in before heading down the stairs and out into the dark night. He was off to get dinner, but he was also out to pick up a little something for Sloane. He walked to a nearby restaurant. The establishment was dimly lit and smoky. After ordering food to go, he made his way to the bar. Perching on a stool, and waited for a tender to approach him.  
  
"What can I get you?" asked the bartender in Russian.  
  
Ian eyed him. The bartender was tall, burly. Not a man to be trifled with. "Vodka. A man's drink."  
  
"You can handle it?" asked the bartender, waiting for the appropriate response.  
  
"And anything you throw at me; I'm from Leningrad."  
  
The bartender nodded. "Why don't you come with me?"  
  
Ian eased off the stool and followed the bartender through the kitchen and through another door to another room. It was cushier, more comfortable than the main restaurant. Obviously whoever had the room made up had plenty of hard currency.  
  
A man who could make deals.  
  
At least, a beautiful woman who sat on the couch, her long brown hair down around her shoulders. "Well, hello again," she said in English.  
  
Ian nodded, setting the briefcase on the table in front of her. "Compliments of Arvin Sloane with best wishes."  
  
Irina Derevko eyed the case and then cast a quick glance at one of her associates, who crossed to the case to examine it. Another crossed to Ian, patting him down.  
  
Ian was unarmed and the case was open, revealing crisp American hundred dollar bills. "One million, hard currency," Ian said.  
  
She smiled slightly, and nodded to another associate, who handed him two brown paper bags. "Your dinner, and your relic."  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Today  
  
Morning  
  
Crystal adjusted the strap of her carryon as she walked towards the door at LAX. She was tired, and she was looking forward to sleeping in her own bed that night. But first? Maybe some coffee. What she wasn't expecting, however, was to see a familiar face near the door.  
  
"Sydney?"  
  
Sydney smiled, crossing towards Crystal. "How are you?"  
  
Crystal hugged her, rather in a daze. "Exhausted, how are you?"  
  
"Not too bad," she said, returning the embrace. "I heard from Melissa that you had a pretty heinous layover and figured I'd take you out for coffee?"  
  
"Oh, you are a mind reader."  
  
Sydney smiled. "C'mon. I'm parked near by. How was the flight?"  
  
"Long."  
  
"I'm sure," she said as the two headed out into the California sunshine. "Good to see your arm is back in full working order," Sydney commented, watching Crystal swap from regular glasses to sunglasses.  
  
"It was a scratch," she said with a smile.  
  
"Good you can smile about it, too," Sydney noticed, sliding her sunglasses on.  
  
"Well, y'know. What doesn't kill you..."  
  
"How is, uh... Sandman?" Sydney asked with a smile, unlocking her car doors.  
  
Crystal smirked, looking at the younger woman. "How's Boy Scout?"  
  
"He's fine."  
  
"So's Sandman."  
  
"Wonderful," Sydney said as the two climbed in.  
  
"It'll be so nice to be home," she said.  
  
"It always is," Sydney said.  
  
"And... It was really great to see you at the airport," she said as she buckled up. "I usually don't get the welcome wagon."  
  
"I do what I can," smiled Sydney.  
  
"I appreciate it," Crystal said. "And ooh... Leg room."  
  
Sydney laughed.  
  
The two continued polite chatter on the drive to Sydney's place, but once they were inside, situated and with coffee, the tone of the conversation changed. "Crys, I was wondering if I could ask you something..."  
  
"Ask me anything."  
  
"Our current assignment is trying to reach Sloane from a different tack."  
  
"How so?" Crystal asked, taking a sip of her coffee.  
  
"We're analyzing pretty much everything SD-6 did while he was in charge."  
  
"You're miracle workers, then?" Crystal asked with a knowing smirk.  
  
"Yeah, they seem think so," smiled Sydney. "But, in all seriousness... There's this guy who Sloane was sending e-mails to. I'm not sure who he is, and I can't seem to access anything on him. I've talked with Dad, and he's shot me down but there's something that just... I think I'm onto something."  
  
"What are you onto?"  
  
"I think there was a mole that SD-6 put into the CIA."  
  
"Really?" Crystal asked, intrigued.  
  
"The way Dad reacts when I say this guy's name... I know he's somebody, he just won't tell me."  
  
"Who is it?"  
  
"I'm hoping you can tell me. We're getting more into your area of time, I think, 1986."  
  
"Yeah..."  
  
"His e-mail address was Iggy."  
  
Crystal smiled. "I don't know an Iggy."  
  
"But I think his real name," Sydney continued, "was Ian Guthrie."  
  
Crystal's smile faded. "What?" she asked quietly.  
  
"We decrypted all these e-mails Sloane sent to 'Iggy' and the name we came up with was Ian Guthrie."  
  
"No," Crystal said, shaking her head. "That's not possible."  
  
"Who is he?"  
  
"He's dead," Crystal said. "It's not him."  
  
"Was he dead in 1986?"  
  
"That's the year he died."  
  
"So this could be him."  
  
Crystal shook her head. "No.  
  
"Who is he?" Sydney repeated.  
  
Crystal set her coffee down and stood. "I'm sorry, Sydney, I need to go."  
  
"Crys--" Sydney was in shock, unaware of what had just happened, but by the time she thought to reach the door and go after her, the other agent had disappeared.  
  
Moscow, Soviet Union  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Night  
  
Ian stood in the center of the room, holding the two bags. "May I speak to you alone?" he asked, looking at Irina.  
  
"Why?"  
  
"I only need a moment of your time."  
  
Irina glanced at her men and nodded. They quietly filed out. "Make it quick."  
  
"I need your help."  
  
"You do? Or Sloane does?"  
  
"I do," he said, setting the bags on the table. "Sloane's got me in a position... I don't even know how I got here. But he's trying to get me to recruit a CIA agent to SD-6. This agent... I have a personal connection to her, and I know she'll never make it in SD-6 but she'll never make it in the CIA without me."  
  
"What does this have to do with me?" Irina asked, fighting a sigh. "It's not my problem."  
  
"I want to make a deal with you."  
  
"A deal?"  
  
"In case I die. In case Sloane kills me, I want you to protect Crystal from Sloane."  
  
"Crystal's this... agent?" Off Ian's nod, she continued. "How do you suggest I protect this woman? And what do you have to bargain with? You're a middle man, a pawn of Arvin Sloane's."  
  
"As of now, the Rambaldi artifact is in my possession, not Sloane's. And the one million dollars is in your possession, not his. If I give you back the artifact, you can auction it off to the highest bidder, someone who's more interested in it than Sloane. For that, I want you to protect Crystal Seaborn's life."  
  
Irina shook her head. "No."  
  
"All she has is me and a vague idea of protecting freedom at home. That's it. She's barely twenty-three. If Sloane gets a hold of her, that's it. He'll pervert her whole mindset."  
  
"This life isn't for the innocent," warned Irina.  
  
"You have a twelve year old daughter..."  
  
"So I'm to feel sorry for your twenty-three year old lover? How do you know about my family?"  
  
"I've worked with your husband, I've been at your house."  
  
"I have no husband."  
  
"Jack Bristow... and your daughter. Sydney."  
  
Irina stood, crossing to him slowly. "Hear me now, Ian. Tell Arvin that any other deals he wants made, he has to come deal with me directly." She picked the brown bag with the artifact from the table. "Leave. Now."  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Yesterday  
  
Night  
  
Josh was really starting to wonder about his rotten luck.  
  
He was beginning to ponder if the White House was cursed. He'd been shot. The White House had been shot at... They lost the Vice President. They lost Sam. Sam lost his election. Sam was targeted by an international terrorist organization. One of the President's daughters had been kidnapped. He'd served under a Republican president for a few days...  
  
And now he was in hell at a Democratic Caucus dinner, discussing everything except what he wanted to discuss. When the conversation veered towards health care, he found his spot to jump in.  
  
"The First Lady's a little miffed at House Democrats in regards to health care at the moment," Josh said.  
  
"Why's that?" asked a Congressman.  
  
"Congressman Wick took the money she'd lobbied for children's health issues and spirited it to national security for reasons... nobody can ascertain."  
  
"Well, you should take it up with Congressman Wick."  
  
"I tried. He directed me to DCI Conrad and I'm getting rather tired of the run-around."  
  
"Josh, it's a trifling amount of money."  
  
"Congressman, the First Lady's Chief of Staff is breathing down my neck."  
  
"You're taking orders from the First Lady's Chief of Staff?"  
  
"That's really not the issue here. The issue is avoiding the Chief Economist all together. We didn't even get a head's up, a friendly phone call."  
  
"We can't tell you everything that we discuss in conference, Josh."  
  
"This wasn't just casually tossed around in conference, this was written and proposed and cut money from children's health issues," Josh said, shaking his head. "What's going on, guys?"  
  
"Take it up with Wick, or with Conrad," said a Congressman definitively.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Morning  
  
Crystal looked at the building with a frown. "A bank?"  
  
"C'mon," said Ian. "Hazard pay. Gotta invest somewhere."  
  
"I've never heard of Credit Dauphine. First American, sure, but..."  
  
"They're the best," he said, leading her in. "An off-shoot from a Swiss bank."  
  
She looked at him sideways. "All right..."  
  
"C'mon, I'll open an account, it'll take twenty, thirty minutes tops."  
  
"Ian--"  
  
"For when we move out here, gotta have a bank account. Your graduation date will be here before you know it. Let's go ahead and have a nest egg."  
  
"All right," she said with a sigh.  
  
"There's my girl," he said as they entered the lobby. "Just have a seat." He watched as she sat and approached the desk. "I have an appointment with Mr. Sloane..." he said, his voice down. He pulled out his wallet, showing identification. "Ian Guthrie."  
  
The woman behind the desk nodded. "If you'll come with me, sir?"  
  
Ian was led through the back of the bank front, to an elevator. Stepping inside, he passed the security check and walked through the office.  
  
Sloane was waiting by his office door, watching Ian cross the floor. "So nice to see you," he said.  
  
The younger man nodded. "Sir."  
  
"Come in," Sloane said, welcoming Ian into his office. "You've come to me empty handed. I'm not sure I like that."  
  
"I got jumped. The Man took the money. There was no artifact in Moscow."  
  
"You got... jumped?" Sloane asked, his face hardening.  
  
"I'm not invincible, Sloane. Sometimes I get jumped."  
  
"I had everything worked out, I personally made the deal with the Man, what happened?"  
  
"Must've gotten spooked."  
  
"How?"  
  
"I don't know how, Sloane, sometimes stuff just happens. I can't control everything in the field."  
  
"You should be able to."  
  
"I'm not perfect. None of us are. There's no way any of us can *possibly* control every single detail that happens in the field. Missions get compromised, it can happen a thousand different ways."  
  
"The latest stats you provided from the CIA say she's perfect. But I'm beginning to wonder why we even have *you*."  
  
"You can't have her," seethed Ian through clenched teeth.  
  
"I can't?" asked Sloane, arching an eyebrow.  
  
"Not until August," he amended.  
  
Sloane said nothing; he merely turned on a television set in his office. On screen, Crystal sat in the bank lobby. Turning up the volume, the two watched as a bank employee approached her.  
  
He was a tall, young black man. "Has someone been by to help you, miss?"  
  
Crystal looked up at him. "Oh, no, I'm just waiting."  
  
"You sure?" he asked.  
  
She smiled, seeing his nametag. "Yeah, Mr. Dixon. I'm just here with a guy opening an account."  
  
You don't want to lose a friendship There's nothing that you have to hide And a little dirt Couldn't hurt no one anyway  
  
Stay tuned...  
  
Lines from the next installment:  
  
She reached the central most room and opened the door... finding nothing but a storage closet.  
  
Crystal frantically radioed Ian. "We've got bad intel, abort. We need to abort now."  
  
Her radio crackled to life. "Not yet." 


	5. Chapter 5 of 5

For notes and disclaimer, please see part one.  
  
Previously, on the West Wing/Alias: In the 80s, Jack and Sloane discuss Crystal and Ian while Ian, in Moscow, makes a deal with Derevko for Sloane only to turn and make his own deal for Crystal's protection. On the return from the Soviet Union, Ian and Crystal stop by Credit Dauphine. Ian and Sloane face off and Sloane shows an agent approaching Crystal in the lobby. More recently, Josh gets suckered by the DCI and Leo tells him to take it up with the Democratic Caucus and, consequently, gets nowhere. Sydney picks Crystal up at the airport and takes her home to discuss Ian. When his name is brought up, she freaks and leaves.  
  
Everybody's got a million questions Everybody wants to know the score What you went through It's something you Should be over now  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Today  
  
Morning  
  
Vaughn entered Sydney's house, shedding his leather jacket and hanging it up. "I don't know what to tell you," he said. "Weiss and I checked the airport, coffee shops... We can't exactly order a manhunt for her."  
  
Sydney sighed. "She hasn't been back by. I only know of one thing left that we can do."  
  
"Wait for her flight?"  
  
Sydney shook her head. "That's still hours away." She picked up the phone, flipping through her address book, dialing a number from the page she stopped on.  
  
Vaughn eased over, to read the page of numbers. His eyes landed on a person they'd met earlier in the year.  
  
Sam Seaborn.  
  
"Hello?"  
  
"Mr. Seaborn, this is Sydney Bristow, we met--"  
  
"Of course I remember you, Agent Bristow. What can I do for you?"  
  
"Crystal..."  
  
Sam's voice was suddenly tense. "What about her? She's... This isn't a condolence call, is it?"  
  
"No, of course not. She's alive and well and was here till about forty-five minutes ago."  
  
"She's in California?"  
  
"On a layover on her way home."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"Mr. Seaborn, she... We were talking about an agent she must've known and before I could do much more than bring up the subject, she left."  
  
"Left?"  
  
"Got up and just... vanished."  
  
"Well, that's nothing new."  
  
"It's not?"  
  
"No. When we were kids, she used to just... disappear."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"For the adventure, at least that's what she used to say. Hence her occupation."  
  
"What would you say?" asked Sydney.  
  
"It's a defense mechanism."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
"She... had a good reason to 'vanish' as a child."  
  
"What's that?"  
  
"To avoid the pain... caused by her father."  
  
"What do you mean?"  
  
"My uncle's a bit of a blustery man, a big guy, very brash... with a penchant for alcohol. And once he's had a glass or two, he would blame his daughter for the problems of the world."  
  
"Verbal abuse?"  
  
Vaughn caught her eyes questioningly.  
  
"There was one time... God, I remember it like it was yesterday... I was spending the summer with her and my uncle and aunt. We'd gotten industrious and changed the lock on the liquor cabinet. Uncle John was so pissed... He started yelling at her and the next thing I know, he's picked her up off the ground, his hands around her neck and she's gasping for breath."  
  
"You're kidding..."  
  
"I wish I were. I'd never seen my uncle act that way, y'know, and I got him off of her... and she starts telling me how this has gone on for years but no one's said a word. John was a prominent criminal attorney. He's since retired but Crys hasn't said one word to him since she turned eighteen."  
  
"Do you think this agent hurt her? That's why she ran?"  
  
Sam sighed slightly. "I don't know. I hope not."  
  
"Okay."  
  
"She usually brushes it off after a while. Or at least... she buries the pain and fights on after an hour or two of cooling off. I wouldn't worry about her too much."  
  
"All right... Thank you."  
  
"Sure."  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Sixteen years, ten months ago  
  
Morning  
  
Ian knocked on Jack's door. When Jack looked up, he could tell the younger man was distraught. "Agent Guthrie."  
  
"Can I come in?" asked Ian.  
  
Jack nodded, and Ian entered, closing the door behind him. "I gotta say, you California guys have it nice. I'd rather be here than in frozen Soviet territory." He quietly picked up a notepad from Jack's desk and started to write, although not about the weather.  
  
"There is something to be said for seasons, though," Jack said, arching an eyebrow as he watched Ian, who handed him the notepad.  
  
'You always were the sane one. I want out.'  
  
"I think I'm ready for some monotone weather."  
  
Jack wrote in return: 'He's onto you.'  
  
While they carried on a bland conversation about the differences in California and D.C. weather, they continued their written conversation.  
  
Ian frantically scribbled. 'I don't think my contingencies for Crystal are going to work. When I leave, I want her out, too.'  
  
Jack was cautious. 'There's only so much one can do to deter Sloane. He's got his sights set on her.'  
  
'I'll die before I let him have her. You've got to help me, Jack.'  
  
Their verbal conversation was winding down and Jack wrote one last message: 'Go. I'll contact you soon.'  
  
Ian nodded. As he turned to leave, Jack tore the paper from the notepad and shredded it.  
  
Washington D.C.  
  
Today  
  
Morning  
  
Josh was in his office, typing an e-mail, when Donna appeared at the door. "You have a visitor at the Southwest entrance."  
  
"Tell me it's a courier..."  
  
"I think it's a courier."  
  
"It's about time," Josh said, saving a draft of the e-mail and heading towards the entrance.  
  
"Mr. Lyman?" asked the courier.  
  
"Yeah, that's me."  
  
"Sign here?" he asked, holding out a clipboard.  
  
Josh did so, and was handed an envelope. He opened it as he started walking back to his office. He sighed. "For cryin' out loud!"  
  
"Josh?" asked Donna, looking up at him. He was almost to his door.  
  
"See if Leo's got a minute," he said, disappearing into his office and closing the door. "Why didn't you just *say* so!" he yelled, his voice only slightly muffled through the wall.  
  
Donna quietly opened his door after making a phone call. "He's got a minute now."  
  
Josh glanced up slightly from the file he'd been couriered. "Great," he said, standing.  
  
"What is it?"  
  
"National security," he said, passing her and heading for his boss's office. He nodded at Margaret before entering Leo's office. "So, I finally got it."  
  
"Finally got what?" Leo asked.  
  
"What all this insanity has been about. With national security."  
  
Leo glanced up from a briefing book, removing his glasses. "What is it?"  
  
"When the CIA took down the Alliance, they destroyed the interior of the SD-6 headquarters in Los Angeles. They want the money to gut the remaining intelligence equipment and get it ready to sell."  
  
"I thought they'd budgeted everything for the Alliance case."  
  
"Yeah, they did sorta. Sorta they didn't. They hadn't counted on bringing in new agents to the CIA. They've blown their budget on the case."  
  
"What are they going to do with the money they make from the sale?"  
  
Josh shook his head slightly. "They're going to donate it to children's health research."  
  
Leo chuckled slightly. "All right. I'll call off the First Lady."  
  
"Thank you."  
  
"You're just going to have to make sure Amy Gardner leaves it alone."  
  
He sighed heavily.  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Sixteen years, nine months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Ian pulled the mail from the box, sifting through the envelopes, selecting a brown padded envelope with no return address. He entered the apartment, dropping the mail on the coffee table and ripping the envelope open, removing a tape, labeled only with three characters: SD-6.  
  
He popped it into the tape player, sliding his headphones on his ears and pressing play. A familiar voice soon filled his head, that of Jack Bristow.  
  
"Your latest mission from Sloane will send you to Hanoi, Vietnam to secure a Rambaldi artifact. It's a talisman that decodes ten pages of the manuscript, or so Sloane wants you to think. It's a trap, Ian. He's tired of your run-around. Your communiqué of last Friday states the CIA wants you in Vietnam for communist information because the NSA picked up on an operation still in planning stages. The easiest way to end this without the loss of your or Crystal's life is to not even try for the talisman. Find out about the operation and tell Sloane you were held up by troops."  
  
Ian exhaled, stopping the tape and sliding the headphones back off, setting them on top of the tape player. As he did so, he heard a key slide into the lock and turned to see Crystal enter, her arms laden with library books. "Hey," he said.  
  
She blew her bangs out of her eyes, managing to close the door with her foot. "Hi."  
  
"How was the library?"  
  
"Hot and stuffy, so I checked out and came home."  
  
He nodded. "I was thinking, for dinner?"  
  
"Hm?" she asked, dropping her books onto the couch, watching them bounce slightly.  
  
"How 'bout a pizza?"  
  
"Sounds great."  
  
"You wanna call out?"  
  
"Yeah, sure," she said, heading towards the phone.  
  
While she was distracted, Ian quickly erased the tape and headed into the kitchen, tossing it into the garbage can, and soon taking out the trash.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Today  
  
A few hours ago  
  
Sydney returned to the CIA office with one goal in mind: to talk to her father. "You have a minute?" she asked.  
  
He nodded.  
  
"I talked to Crystal Seaborn today."  
  
"Oh?"  
  
"About Ian Guthrie."  
  
Jack's expression was unreadable. "I told you to leave it alone."  
  
"And I didn't. Tell me what I don't know. Tell me why Crystal bolted the minute I brought up his name and the possibility of his being a mole."  
  
"Ian Guthrie was Crystal's first partner."  
  
Sydney frowned slightly. "What?"  
  
"Ian Guthrie was Crystal Seaborn's first partner," he repeated. "Ian was... approached by Sloane. He was a double agent. And sometimes a triple agent. No one ever really knew what side he was on. He located several Rambaldi artifacts for Sloane. Like us, he was sent on counter missions. He was his own man, Sydney. He was a maverick. He was... I think he was the best con artist the CIA ever had."  
  
"Why?"  
  
"He had... issues. That he was mostly able to hide. He had a twisted sense of duty, a twisted sense of love."  
  
"Love?" Sydney repeated.  
  
"He and Crystal were... more than partners."  
  
She nodded slowly. "That explains why she left. But, if he was mentally... unstable... why was he still an agent? Why wasn't he benched?"  
  
"It was the Cold War with a staunchly Republican president. We needed every last person to fight Communism."  
  
She nodded a little.  
  
"The other thing..."  
  
She looked at her father.  
  
"Sloane tried to recruit her."  
  
"What?"  
  
"Sloane tried to use Ian to recruit her to SD-6."  
  
"Obviously it didn't happen..."  
  
"Correct."  
  
"So, then... what did happen?"  
  
Hanoi, Vietnam  
  
Sixteen years, nine months ago  
  
Night  
  
"Here's what's happening," Ian said, sitting in a dingy hotel room with Crystal. "The NSA sent new information on the operation that's being planned. Information's being sent back and forth from here to Moscow like there's no tomorrow, which... there may not be. This Cold War might get hot again."  
  
Crystal nodded.  
  
Ian unrolled blue prints across the bed between them. "The communications center is here," he said, indicating a room in the central most part of the building. "There's only one way in and one way out of this room. You're going to enter the building from the South side, and work your way in this way and disable the communications apparatus. Before you do that, I'm going to be entering through here," he said, indicating the northern entrance. "And I'm going to disable the security system located here ten minutes after my entry. Any questions?"  
  
"None."  
  
"Let's get going," he said, standing. He watched as Crystal stood, shouldering her equipment pack. "Hey, Crys..."  
  
"Yeah?" she asked.  
  
"I love you."  
  
She smiled. "Love you, too. C'mon!"  
  
They took separate cars to the building. Crystal waited the prerequisite ten minutes before entering the building from the South. She moved methodically, waiting for the ambush she was sure would come for her. Ian had disarmed the security system, the building should be in a state of chaos, but she saw no one.  
  
Something was wrong.  
  
She reached the central-most room and opened the door... finding nothing but a storage closet.  
  
Crystal frantically radioed Ian. "We've got bad intel, abort. We need to abort now."  
  
Her radio crackled to life. "Not yet."  
  
"There's nothing here. There's no communications center." She looked up, spotting a person appear around a corner. Raising her service weapon, she fired before taking cover. "We need to get out. Now! I'll meet you outside."  
  
"Not yet!" Ian returned.  
  
The next voice Crystal heard over her radio was not Ian's and it did not speak in English. She sprinted towards the Northern part of the building, to locate her partner, listening to the rushed conversation in Vietnamese. As she reached the room where Ian said the security office was held, she watched in horror as the man she loved was murdered.  
  
"IAN!"  
  
The momentary shock and terror had to be just that--momentary--as the gun was soon trained on her. She fired off three rounds into his killer before fleeing. She changed the frequency on her radio, calling the nearest CIA headquarters.  
  
"This is Patriot requesting emergency exit from Hanoi, Vietnam. Rebel is down, repeat..." Her voice cracked slightly. "Rebel is down."  
  
"Copy that, Patriot, proceed to EX-12 and wait for communication," responded the voice over her radio.  
  
"What about Rebel?"  
  
"This line's no longer safe; radio silence until EX-12."  
  
Crystal entered the sedan Ian had left parked a few blocks from their target, tossing her equipment into the passenger seat and quickly taking off. Glancing in the rearview mirror, she saw the building explode.  
  
Her heart shattered.  
  
Orange County, California  
  
Today  
  
A few hours ago  
  
She knocked on his door quietly, a shell-shocked look on her face.  
  
Sam opened the door to his little house, surprised to see her there. "Crys."  
  
"Hi," she whispered.  
  
"Come in?"  
  
"Thanks," she said, entering.  
  
"I got a call from one of your friends in the CIA."  
  
"Sydney."  
  
He nodded.  
  
"I just... I thought I was past all this."  
  
"I know," he said gently.  
  
"I thought I was doing pretty good, moving on."  
  
He nodded again.  
  
"I have a flight back in a little while, but I just wanted to come by and see you..."  
  
"I'm glad you did."  
  
"Y'know, you're my constant. The only thing that has been for my whole life."  
  
Sam quietly pulled his cousin into his arms, hugging her. "I'm always going to be here for you."  
  
"I know," she whispered.  
  
"Though, I think there's another guy who'd like that job, too."  
  
"Josh."  
  
He nodded.  
  
"Yeah..."  
  
"What do you think about that?"  
  
"I think... that'd be nice. I think... that I thought I was over things that I wasn't and I need to be for that to happen first."  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Sixteen years, nine months ago  
  
Afternoon  
  
Jack entered Sloane's office. "You wanted to hear when Guthrie and Seaborn returned to the states?"  
  
"Well?"  
  
"Agent Seaborn is back in Washington."  
  
"What about Guthrie?"  
  
"He was killed in the building explosion."  
  
Sloane smiled slightly. "We'll get her."  
  
Jack's expression was flat as he gave Sloane a curt nod.  
  
Los Angeles, California  
  
Today  
  
Hours ago  
  
"Did he ever try again?" Sydney asked.  
  
"He tossed around theories to get her to join SD-6. But he didn't count on her loyalty to the CIA, to the country. While it was easy to recruit those who weren't in the business yet, she was there. Plus, going without Ian... There was no way that would happen."  
  
"That explains so much," she said.  
  
"But it failed to meet our objective."  
  
Sydney nodded slightly. "To find Sloane."  
  
"Which is why I tried to move you off that route. It wasn't necessary. It wouldn't turn up any information we could use."  
  
"Yeah... I should apologize to Crystal."  
  
"If I were you..."  
  
She looked at her father.  
  
"I wouldn't bring up Ian again. No one wants to know they were the victim of a con artist, of a double agent. The heart doesn't belong in this business."  
  
"But it's there."  
  
"Think of how much easier it would be otherwise."  
  
"I don't think it'd be easier. I think it'd be harder. No one would care one way or the other about the job, about the country. The heart belongs here, Dad."  
  
Washington, D.C.  
  
Today  
  
Half an hour ago  
  
Donna met Crystal in the lobby. She smiled slightly. "He's still in a meeting, but he should be out shortly."  
  
Crystal returned the smile. "Okay."  
  
"C'mon, you can wait in his office."  
  
Crystal followed the young assistant, her hands in the pockets of her zippered Princeton sweatshirt.  
  
"You want some coffee?"  
  
"No, I'm fine, thanks."  
  
"How was the flight?"  
  
"Long," Crystal said with a tired smile. "It's nice not to be at cruising altitude anymore."  
  
"I'm sure it is."  
  
"Crys?"  
  
She turned, seeing Josh head down the corridor towards her. "Josh."  
  
He hugged her, lifting her off the floor an inch or two. "How are you?" he asked softly.  
  
"Tired," she murmured, her feet back on the ground.  
  
"Listen, tonight, there's this thing I sorta forgot about."  
  
"Hm?"  
  
"It's a memorial--candlelight vigil--commemorating the survivors of the Vietnam War at the Wall and I told Leo I'd be there, 'cause he was in the Air Force and served over there."  
  
"What time?"  
  
"About half an hour."  
  
"Can I go with you?"  
  
"You want to?"  
  
She nodded. "I know people who served there, too. Some who lived and some who died."  
  
"Great," he said softly. "Come in my office and hang out for thirty minutes?"  
  
"Sounds like a great plan."  
  
As they continued onto the office together, the phone on Donna's desk rang: "Josh Lyman?" She shook her head. "Hold on a moment." Putting her hand over the mouthpiece, she looked at her boss. "It's Amy Gardner."  
  
Josh exhaled. "Put her through." He looked at Crys. "I don't know how long this'll take."  
  
She shrugged. "I'm here."  
  
He smiled, kissing her cheek softly. "Thanks."  
  
Everybody wants to hear the secrets That you never told a soul before And it's not that strange Because it wouldn't change What happened anyhow  
  
End. 


End file.
